How to read the IG report

John posted the State Department Inspector General’s report on Hillary Clinton’s private email server for the conduct of her official business as Secretary of State here. John also excerpted a few telling passages from the report that expose a few of the repeated lies Clinton has told about her arrangement.

Andrew McCarthy is the former Assistant United States Attorney who had substantial professional experience dealing with serious issues of national security. At NR’s Corner he contributes some valuable advice on how to read the report.

Andy notes that Clinton and her deputies declined requests to be interviewed as part of the IG’s investigation. “When a government official or former government official refuses to answer questions in a formal government investigation into potential wrongdoing, this in effect is the assertion of a legal privilege not to speak — otherwise, there is no valid reason not to cooperate.”

He asks: “So what conceivable legal privilege do Clinton, Mills, Sullivan, and Abedin have that would allow them to refuse to answer investigators’ questions? Only one: the Fifth Amendment privilege — i.e., the refusal to answer on the grounds that truthful responses might be incriminating.”

He concludes:

The media was abuzz a few months back when it emerged that Brian Pagliano, the old Clinton hand who was placed on the State Department payroll to service Hillary’s homebrew server, had been given immunity for prosecution in exchange for cooperating with the FBI. Why was it such a big story? Because the conferral of immunity implied that Pagliano believed he’d be incriminating himself if he cooperated with investigators.

Well . . . what are we to make of the refusal by Clinton, Mills, Sullivan, and Abedin to cooperate with the Obama State Department IG?

What are we to make of Mrs. Clinton’s public posturing that of course she is prepared to cooperate — and encourages her subordinates to cooperate — with government investigators?

And how is a former high government official who systematically evaded federal records requirements and then refused to cooperate with a government investigation into that evasion conceivably fit to be president of the United States?